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Hey, hey…Hey guys! You see that picture right there?! That was my new “to-do” item. CHECKED OFF! Why the excitement? Well, you see, in yesterday’s post – I’m truly awful at this – I said I’d talk about my new to-do…

…And I did! Not but a day later (sure beats 75 days ;).

Monday evening I was sitting in the backyard enjoying a nice, cold refreshing beverage with a friend and staring at the plants, bushes, trees and what was supposedly keeping things in order. Yes, you guessed it, those planters. I realized they had definitely seen better days. The last time those poor things had seen any love was over ten years ago when my grandpa was in the country. He decided to stain them from their natural wood to this odd rusty/orange-y stain, sans sealant. So the weather wear and tear was clearly evident. Ten summers, ten winters and ten in-between the good seasons is A LOT for barely treated wood to handle.

Unlike my extremely poor DIY post about the Beluga dresser and two tables, I’m going to explain what I’ve done here. SUPER EASY! (Oh and before I forget, I used BEHR paint, named Beluga for the dresser – as for the dining room table it’s the same stuff I’ve used here so keep on reading!).

1. I washed and scrubbed down the surface of each of the planter, because I knew I wasn’t going to sand them down (weather helped me out here) I used old-school laundry detergent and warm/hot water and a harsh scrub brush.

2. After doing this to all of them, I rinsed and let them dry off in the sun – thank goodness for this excruciatingly hot weather, cuts down on the drying time for EVERYTHING!

3. I used Varathane Woodstain in Kona. This step was the most tedious. Due to already staining a gigantic table with this stuff I did it my own way, rather than the way the can tells me to. I used a paint brush, painted on the stain on one side, waiting two minutes and wiped down with a cotton cloth. Then went on to the next side, waited two minutes and wiped again. I repeated this step on all the planters and let them all dry for approximately three hours and then did a second coat.

4. The next day (today) I used good ol’ MINWAX Fast-Drying Polyurethane in a Clear Gloss. The reason I chose this stuff is simple, it was left over from another project and that had turned out great :).

Now, I’ve got pretty dark dark dark brown glossy planters, which make the flowers POPand I spent absolutely nothing! Sometimes, going through the garage and tidying up is a good thing, you never know what you’ll find to help ya out with a DIY.

The only problem with this project was that I wore shorts and flip-flops, I came inside and couldn’t believe the mess I made of myself yet I’m all smiles.